Free AIDS drugs from today, with or without price pact

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Free AIDS drugs from today, with or without price pact

P.T. Jyothi Datta, Mumbai , March 31

THE absence of an agreement on drug prices will not hold up the

Government's initiative to make free anti-AIDS drugs available to

people living with HIV/AIDS from April 1.

The Government will kick off the first quarter of the free AIDS-drugs

initiative on Thursday in eight centres located in States where the

prevalence of the illness is high. The anti-AIDS drugs to support the

first quarter of this initiative have been procured by the World

Health Organisation (WHO), said Ms Meenakshi Datta Ghosh, Project

Director, National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO).

Speaking to Business Line, she said that WHO has, through its

existing procurement mechanism, sourced and delivered the medicines

at the identified centres, giving the Government four months to sort

out drug price issues with pharma companies.

By that time the elections would be over and the new Government would

be in place, which would help budget the allocations to support the

programme. The Union Health Minister, Ms Sushma Swaraj, announced the

free anti-AIDS drugs programme on the eve of the last World AIDS Day

(December 1). The cost of the project was estimated to be Rs 200

crore.

Meanwhile, organisations working in the health sector said that

pharmaceutical companies such as Cipla that were active in making

anti-AIDS drugs accessible in Africa, needed to bring down prices in

India too.

" India has about 4.2 million people suffering from the illness and

about 10 per cent of them would require drugs. If pharma companies

were able to offer drugs to the Clinton Foundation at prices close to

Rs 17 per day per patient ($140 or about Rs 6,078 for a year), they

should be able to match that or better it for Indian patients. "

Pharma company representatives, however, said that prices and

accessing drugs are not related. " It is not the money that makes a

difference - the infrastructure to make the drugs available needs to

be in place, the medical fraternity needs to be trained on the issue

and systems need to be in place to monitor the administration of the

medicines to keep a check on patients developing drug resistance. "

Further, they point out that the Government's promise of fiscal

incentives to the pharma and diagnostic companies got derailed with

the Government going into an election mode, thus delaying the

budgeting exercise.

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2004/04/01/stories/200404010268050

0.htm